


Before I Stopped Believing

by IShipItAllAndThenSome



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Bad Translations Because I Suck At Languages, Closeted!Lena, Episode s3e04: The Faithful, F/F, Implied/Referenced Sex, Lena Luthor is a Gay Mess, Lesbian Lena Luthor, Lex Used To Be Fun, Pre-Canon, Underage Drinking, one way this week's episode could've gone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-01
Updated: 2017-11-01
Packaged: 2019-01-27 21:06:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,464
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12590532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IShipItAllAndThenSome/pseuds/IShipItAllAndThenSome
Summary: Lena Luthor, age 19, is bad at making good decisions around pretty women, but she's phenomenal at damage control.





	Before I Stopped Believing

Technically, Lena was on spring break.

Practically, she was here for Lex. He was looking into business contacts on the West Coast, and Lena, being off school, was in prime position to come by.

“It’s right between San Francisco and Los Angeles,” he pleaded. “The sunscreen will be a business expense, as will the cocktails.”

“I’m nineteen.”

“So?”

Lena’d snorted, rolling over to look at her suitcase where it laid next to her on her bed. Empty. 

Lillian had insisted she get a single so she wouldn’t be distracted. It had worked all too well; she never did anything that wasn’t homework, and as such, had no friends. No one to invite her to Florida or Cabo or some other godforsaken sunspot of a city, to be shocked by her lack of swimsuits and jean shorts or her sky-high alcohol tolerance. 

(She’s a Luthor; they drink.)

“Fine,” she said, “I’ll go. But I want time to look at labs, too.”

“Of course. You’ll be head of R&D once you graduate; you need to get a feel for the lay of the land.”

She’d grinned, not bothering to suppress her smile, and rolled out of bed, landing poorly on sock feet and almost falling on her ass.

“Lena?”

“I’m fine! Packing.”

“For..?”

“For stupid California.”

Lex had laughed at her, but she hadn’t felt scorned, throwing her clothes into her suitcase still on the hanger and pirouetting on the laminated wood floor. 

“I can only stay for a week, and then I have fencing in London.”

“I won’t keep you from your weird Joan of Arc LARP.”

“You better pick me up at the airport.”

“Cross my heart.”

Lex did pick her up at the airport, like a good brother, but he also ditches her on the second day of her trip because, _ooh, Erika’s in town_.

“Your crush on her is painful, Lex,” Lena drawled, trying not to seem childish, even though being disgruntled at a business partner reneging on you is totally reasonable. “Really, truly - it hurts me to watch you grovel.”

“She’s gorgeous, yes. Smart, yes. Rich, though, _that_ is why I pursue Ms. del Portenza. She could give Luthor Corp enough overhead to fund every project internally.”

“It’s not internally if the money comes from an investor.”

Lex just shrugged, smirking, then let out an exasperated sigh. “Fucking ties.”

“Tie your own damn ties, Lex,” Lena groaned, but she was already off the hotel bed, helping with his double Windsor. “There.”

“Fantastic.” Lex ducked and kissed her forehead. “I’m off. Try not to get kidnapped or something.”

Lena laughed. Only the two of them could get away with making that joke to each other, and only they would find that joke funny. They actually ran a betting pool on who would get kidnapped next, and when, and by whom. 

Lena’s money was on Lex, that Canadian tech company’s Ukrainian mob connections, and before Christmas. Lex was convinced it would be her, and they’d get her back for New Year’s.

One way or another, Lex was out on his weird business date with the admittedly beautiful Italian heiress, and Lena was off to the Baldwin to talk to a French silicon mine operator. Her fluency was still pristine, but her business jargon was rusty.

_“Voulez-vous investir ton temps dans Luthor Corp?”_

Lena wrinkled her nose. 

“Ugh.”

The miner never showed. 

In a black and gold baroque-embroidered dress that was only just more here than sheer, Lena could pull off twenty one, and even so, a Centurion AmEx was far more convincing. Usually, on business, she drank Man Drinks, because they were such a power move, but part of her was just angry and off the clock and wanted to be drunk, so she opened her mouth to order a Long Island Iced Tea.

Because why the fuck not?

The bartender, in her little black button-up with the sleeves rolled to cocktail shaker-honed bicep height and sleek braids, was prompt in making it, and shot her a wink as she set the glass down on a napkin with, _trop mal,_ no phone number. 

Lena moved the stirrer aside and took a heavy swig. 

It didn’t taste like alcohol.

Excellent.

Still, the part of Lena that wasn’t 3000% ready to devolve into pure Woo Girlishness - the part who remembered that this was a public space, technically, and that cameras were everywhere - made her pace herself. 

She was almost finished by the time a soft hand, with velvety fingertips and neat fingernails manicured a deep burgundy, touched her wrist. 

 _“Peccato,”_ this woman purred, voice as rich as her Oak Moss perfume, “pretty girls should not drink alone.”

Lena chanced a look at her and swallowed hard. “Then why are you?”

“Am I?” She sipped her wine - a red as leggy as she was, the same shade as her dress and her nails - and smiled. _“Ohimè_ , I thought we were drinking together.”

“But I’m not drinking.” Lena arched an eyebrow towards her hand, still restrained by those elegant fingers. 

“Certainly not _that_.”

The woman summoned the bartender, ordered a glass of _Brachetto_ for Lena, and introduced herself, though there was a twinkle in her eye that made it quite clear she knew Lena knew who she was already. 

 _“Grazie,”_ Lena thanked her, only a hair less competent than her French and took a sip. Sweet - candy-like and almost cloying. 

Appropriate for an underage drinker. 

“So, why are you here alone?”

“Waiting for dinner. _E tu, occhi verdi?_ ”

“Business fell through.”

“ _Uffa!_ No business tonight. Have dinner with me, instead.”

 _“Alla buon’ora,”_ Lena said with affected dryness, “I thought you’d never ask.”

☆

They went to dinner. The woman who needed no introduction was an incredible conversationalist, and when she chose to, she could obviously speak without an accent. It, like Lena’s usual choice of drink, was a power move, and one she - and the shivers down her spine - could appreciate. 

More so with the blatant flirting. 

Come dessert, an apple and huckleberry crisp with the most obnoxiously incredible vanilla ice cream Lena had ever laid eyes upon.

“So, _occhi verdi…_ ” 

Lena swallowed. _Okay, well, she’s going to ask me up to her room._ “Mm-hm?”

_“Sei statto battezzato?”_

In her defense, Lena was one hotel-huge LIIT and about half a bottle of wine deep, an actual idiot, and not even slightly expecting that. Her laughing was probably the least offensive or embarrassing thing she could have done.

It still didn’t go over well.

Despite, y’know, being gay, Lena’s impromptu dinner date is a dyed-in-the-wool Catholic. Who only has sinful extramaritals with, like, naughty altar girls or whatever.

Suffice it to say, her second date that evening falls through. She goes back to the bar.

“Bad luck?” the bartender asks.

She’s cute. Cut _er,_ somehow. Her collar is unbuttoned one further, and she leans on her elbow on the bartop with her pristine rag folded casually over one shoulder. She knotted her braids back in a lazy bun with one of the two elastic bands on her wrist.

 _“Povero me,”_ Lena said with an exaggerated pout. 

It got a laugh out of the bartender, who made Lena something which was _not_ a Long Island Iced Tea. It was gingery and sweet, and she squeezed in a lime wedge with a one-handed flourish before tossing it over her shoulder towards a trash can.

She missed, horribly, and Lena giggled.

“I’m Lena,” she said, extending her hand. 

“Maya.” Maya took Lena’s hand, shook it. She had a good grip and confident fingers, and she gave a sheepish grin. “Should’ve wiped down first - I’m afraid I’m a little sticky.”

“I don’t mind a little mess.”

Maya was fun. Maya was twenty, working through a BA in Literature, and had a tattoo of a porcupine on her ribs in pthalo blue stick’n’poke ink. 

Maya didn’t make it into the pictures that made the West Coast gossip rags by morning, thank god, but after Lena’s Google alert for her own name woke her at three a.m. for the online releases, she packed and fled. On her ride to the godforsaken airport, she issued a cease and desist to every one of them with the Legal department’s letterhead and managed to keep them from printing before Lillian found out.

“I’m heading out early,” was how she opened her phone call to Lex.

“No shit,” he grumbled. “It’s five a.m.”

“I know. I was kind enough to wait two hours before calling, but, uh… Something came up.”

“Mm-hm.”

“How’s _Erika?_ ”

_“Molto bene.”_

“Your accent is atrocious.”

“She likes it.”

Lena gagged, only partially in jest, but sobered quickly. “Good. We’re gonna need her.”

“Lena, what did you do?”

“Absolutely no one.” _Idiot._ “Nothing!”

Lex laughed. “Go get ‘em, kiddo. Enjoy your flight.”

“Bleh.”

**Author's Note:**

> so, like... guess who keeps on drabblin'? #ThisBish #StopMePls 
> 
> no but seriously. I don't know why??? I wrote this??? but here it is, so, like, pls don't hate it? but also I wrote it in like an hour and I'm impulse posting to keep myself awake until my executive dysfunction fucks off enough that I can do homework before class in five hours so... if it sucks I see it coming
> 
> This can be seen as pre-Under The Same Sun, or as its own standalone thing, but either way, my head canon is largely the same: Lena started college early, graduated with her Masters at 19, and met Jack that same year. Instead of going into Luthor Corp or getting a PhD, she decided to strike out on her own with, like, her first ever friend and cure cancer. They worked together as besties in a tiny shitty rental house in New Jersey, where Metropolis supposedly is (ew), for three years, then "dated" for two, each thinking they were sort of using each other unwittingly as a beard. And then Lex goes nanners, and Lena leaves, and everything sucks, and then it's fine for 0.02 seconds, and then it sucks again. So!


End file.
